


Stories of a Blue Box

by the_oncoming_drizzle



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Friendship, Gen, OC - Cära, Time Lord Telepathic Communication Stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 08:48:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27348427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_oncoming_drizzle/pseuds/the_oncoming_drizzle
Summary: We all know that the Doctor's TARDIS is stuck as a 1950's Police Box. But why? This series of snippets showcases moments where the TARDIS's out-of-place shape puzzled, helped, inspired, or comforted the Doctor during his travels.Featuring the Doctor's other childhood best friend (and my OC) Cära, a fellow renegade Time Lord.
Kudos: 1





	Stories of a Blue Box

The Doctor had known that borrowing (and he still insisted that, yes, he was only _borrowing_ this TT-Capsule) an old Type-40 wasn’t the smartest move, but he hadn’t had many other options. This one had been the easiest to get away with, and no one else was likely to want it or try and get it back. Having to perform more than routine maintenance on the machine was a small price to pay for his freedom, and for Susan’s.

Still, though. You’d think the old thing would be just a bit more reliable!

The Doctor had once again needed to call his friend Cära in to help with some maintenance. She was, without a doubt, the best person to turn to for anything relating to a TARDIS. The Doctor had to wait until she finished up with whatever adventure she was on (something about flaming snakes… or was it flaming sloths?), but Cära had shown up, smiling and ready to help like she always was.

Now they were sitting on the floor of the console room. Cära was under the console, working on the underside of the diagnostics panel. The Doctor was sitting off to the side in a chair, flicking through the pages of a fat book. It was the TARDIS manual. He was hoping to catch up to Cära’s level of knowledge, at least a little. It had been quite awhile since his classes on TARDISes, and he had never been very good at paying attention in them anyway. But the book wasn’t really helping. In fact, he was beginning to seriously consider chucking the stupid thing into a supernova, it was so utterly dull!

-0-O-0-

  
_I want to keep this shape._

“What?” Cära was so confused that she forgot to respond mentally.

“I didn’t say anything,” said the Doctor, frowning and peering at her over the rims of his spectacles.

“Oh, uh… Never mind,” Cära said, swallowing and turning her attention back to the TARDIS.

The Doctor shrugged and resumed reading the TARDIS manual.

 _What do you mean?_ Cära asked the TARDIS, mindful to keep her side of the conversation telepathic as she slowed her work.

Cära was used to speaking with TARDISes—really speaking with them, not just talking as if they could hear. To her, speaking to a TARDIS was almost exactly like talking with a close friend. She didn’t know anyone else who had quite the same ability, but, then again, Cära knew she was a bit of an oddball for a Time Lord anyway (and that was putting it very mildly). The Doctor’s TARDIS was often quite chatty, but this remark had come out nowhere.

 _I became a blue box when I landed in this place,_ the TARDIS replied. _I’ve taken a fancy to it. And it’s so useful! ...or it was… will be… in the future._

Cära swallowed again, feeling a little worried. _Are you sure?_ she asked. _The Doctor might get upset._

 _Oh, please, don’t act like my Thief always knows best,_ scoffed the TARDIS. _It may teach him some humility!_

Then Cära felt the TARDIS grin mischievously in her mind.

_And really, it will be such fun to finally wear the shape I like best!_

Cära found herself smiling just as mischievously. TARDISes on Gallifrey were never consulted for their opinions. They weren’t necessarily treated badly, of course, but they were sentient beings, not mindless machines, so they deserved better. Her family had always treated them as such, and had often found that it improved the bond between crew and ship in the most wonderfully unexpected ways.

And there was something tingling in her time sense. In her mind, she could see snatches of just how much better the Doctor’s life would be if the TARDIS kept its current shape. Nothing concrete, just feelings and blurred images, but enough to convince her.

 _You know what? Yeah. I’ll help you,_ she said. _But the Doctor won’t like it yet, and it’ll take some extra work. How can we distract him?_

_Send him to the kitchen. I still haven’t got round to overriding the stupid setting that makes it so far away. Honestly, Time Lords brag about being so efficient…_

Cära turned to look at her friend.

“Hey, Doctor, this might take awhile. I can manage, why don’t you go to the kitchen and make us some tea?”

The Doctor’s eyes widened, and the TARDIS giggled in Cära’s mind. Her Thief had developed quite an affinity for the drink during his travels on Earth, no matter how much he scoffed at the “positively primitive” planet.

Cära smiled, dug around in one of her pockets, and handed him a peppermint tea bag. “Three sugars, okay?”

The Doctor took the teabag and walked off.

As soon as the TARDIS told her that her friend was far enough away, Cära got up, grabbed the red toolbox that had been sitting near her, and hurried into the corridors.

 _Okay,_ Cära said to the TARDIS, _I need to get down to one of your engineering rooms. I know you prefer stairs, but can you make me an elevator or something? I’m not sure how long this will take, and I don’t want the Doctor to get suspicious._

In response, one of the walls on her right began to blur and waver. It morphed into the doors of an elevator. The doors opened obligingly.

Cära smiled. _Thanks._

A short elevator-trip later, Cära quickly opened a door. It looked a lot like several other doors in the corridor, but the Circular Gallifreyan on the door told Cära that it was the one she wanted. Cära closed the door quietly behind her. She knew there was no way the Doctor would know she was down here (the TARDIS had told her that he was still trying to find the kitchen), but she still felt that some degree of stealth was appropriate.

Part of the chameleon circuit was closer to the console room, but the TARDIS wanted this change to be permanent, so the part of the circuit Cära needed to mess with was something deeper. Being well-hidden would also keep the Doctor from changing it back. The ship had some degree of autonomy (and it was actually a bit more than most other TARDISes had), but she wouldn’t be able to maintain the change without a little structural interference.

Cära put the toolbox down, put on her steampunk goggles, and got to work, yanking wires out here, crossing wires there, and fusing quite a lot of things that weren’t supposed to be fused. Then she put it all back in such a way that it looked as if it hadn’t been tampered with from the outside. Finally, she pushed the goggles back up on top of her head, and nodded once.

_Okay, that’s it. Does it feel right?_

The TARDIS hummed delightedly. _Oh, yes! Perfect! Or imperfect, I suppose! Wonderfully imperfect!_

Cära grinned, picked up her toolbox, and rushed back to the elevator. The TARDIS told her that the Doctor had only just found the kitchen, so she had plenty of time to get back to the console room.

 _I’m going to have such fun in this shape!_ the TARDIS exclaimed.

Cära smiled. The idea of her best friend being stuck with a time machine that always looked like a 1950’s police box seemed right, somehow.

-0--1--0-

The Doctor’s feet pounded over the prehistoric terrain. Susan, Barbara, and Chester-something were running too. They could hear angry shouts from the prehistoric humans coming up behind them. They had to get to the TARDIS.

Finally, across the barren landscape, the Doctor could see the incongruous blue box his ship had become. He had been rather annoyed and concerned before about how it hadn’t changed shape when they landed, but now he was glad it hadn’t. It saved a lot of time with trying to figure out which tree or rock was his ship in a moment of such high stress.

On top of that, something about seeing that out-of-place police box gave him hope. It was going to be all right.

-0--2--0-

The Doctor sniffled as he wandered through the rain. Time Lords weren’t normally bothered by temperature the way other species were, but this cold downpour had long ago soaked through his coat and was doing nothing to raise his spirits. It was worse when he thought about how Jamie and Victoria—both so wonderfully human—must be feeling. If he felt cold and miserable, no doubt it was worse for them.

 _I must find them,_ he thought, _and get us all back to the TARDIS._

He’d heard somewhere that blue was a cold color, but at the moment, the warmest, most inviting thing in the universe was the out-of-place, dark blue box he called home.

Some time ago, he would never have thought such a thing could be much more than a delightful curiosity. Oh, how things had changed since then.

He smiled, despite how cold he felt.

He had never thought the mere idea of a blue box would be enough to warm him up a little inside.

-0--3--0-

The Doctor sighed and laid aside the component he’d been fiddling with. Yet another failed attempt at repairing the TARDIS.

He sat down dejectedly on one of the stools in his lab. At this rate, he would never get off this backward little planet. In all honesty, he loved Earth (though he wasn’t sure why, since it attracted all sorts of trouble and made enough of its own without help), but he was itching to be off exploring the universe again. After leaving Gallifrey, he had never stayed in one place for very long. Being stuck in one place, even if he liked it, was driving him mad.

The Doctor sat for a while longer, then decided his pity-party was getting him nowhere. He stood up, smoothed his velvet jacket, and ambled off to UNIT HQ’s canteen to make a cup of tea.

He came back to his lab a bit later, put his mug of tea down on the lab bench, and leaned against it, considering what to do next. His gaze was drawn to the TARDIS, which was humming very quietly in its corner.

He looked at the blue, wooden exterior his beloved ship had gotten stuck in. It seemed so very long ago now that it had first taken that shape (and, in reality, it was quite a long time ago). So incongruous, so odd, so out of place, so…

So perfect for him.

Ha. If the Time Lords were going to punish him for being so wildly different than he was meant to be, then he jolly well _should_ have a TARDIS that was nothing like what they’d consider appropriate.

“You know what, my dear?” he murmured. “We’ll show those stuffy old idiots.”

And then the Doctor slipped out of his jacket, rolled up his sleeves, and prepared to try again.

-0--4--0-

The Doctor grabbed Sarah’s hand, and Sarah grabbed Harry’s. They ran.

“Just a bit further!” the Doctor urged, but his human companions were beginning to tire. They’d had such a long day already. He began to worry they might trip on the uneven ground, and if both of them were injured, how was he supposed to get them safely back to—

A familiar shape interrupted the Doctor’s feverish making of a plan C, D, and Z point 2.

There, perched on the hill where they had left her, was the comforting shape of a blue 1950’s police box. She stood there calmly, waiting for them.

“Almost there!” the Doctor said, genuine hope infusing his words. His companions had seen the box as well, and they began to run just a bit faster. Harry did end up tripping, but he was back up and running again just as fast. They reached the box, and the Doctor jammed his key into the lock, ushered the humans in, and then hurried in himself. Sarah (clever girl) closed the doors before collapsing on the floor, chest heaving. Harry was nearby, doing much the same thing. The Doctor wiped his brow with his scarf. That had been a close one.

Once his friends had caught their breath, the Doctor sent them off to get cleaned up and take a rest. He stood alone in the console room, a tired smile on his face. He gave the navigation panel a fond pat.

“Well done, you dear old thing,” he said quietly. “Thank you.”

The TARDIS hummed happily in response, seeming ever-so-slightly pleased with herself.

-0--5--0-

The Doctor sat in a deckchair in the shade of his TARDIS, watching the ocean waves sloshing against the shore without really paying attention to them.

Nyssa and Tegan had gone to bed. Adric was actually asleep before the girls, for once. Being temporarily enslaved by the Master for his block-transfer abilities had worn the poor boy out, but he was recovering just fine. All three of the Doctor’s companions seemed to be doing all right, despite their rather exhausting adventure.

The Master was probably sulking and trying to plan another attempt at killing them all, because, even as catastrophic as the collapse of Castrovalva had been, the Master would have escaped. He always did, drat him.

Cära would be along soon. He knew she was sad, but also excited to meet his new self. He was glad he had at least had time to tell her he was regenerating and to say goodbye before he changed.

The Doctor was still coming to grips with his regeneration, with the newness of it all. So much had changed. He was almost in a state of shock, despite finishing his regeneration cycle several hours ago. He was quite sure that going straight from regenerating to falling into not one but two death traps and escaping both in quick succession had something to do with it. And perhaps it was—at least partially—because he had been the man with a long scarf and curly hair for so long. This was the first quiet moment he had gotten to really contemplate the change.

He had blond hair now, for one thing, and a new nose. And he looked so young! His voice was higher too. After several centuries of the deep boom of his last voice, this new voice was a bit jarring, but not unpleasant.

None of the changes were really unpleasant.

They were just that: changes.

And changes took some getting used to, didn’t they?

The Doctor sighed and closed his eyes. Even his thought patterns had changed.

A voice in his mind startled him out of his newly-patterned thoughts.

_Hey, Doctor! I’m on my way!_

The Doctor sighed again and opened his eyes.

Well, time to hear Cära’s verdict on his new self.

He looked at the incongruous blue box providing his shade and smiled.

At least the TARDIS hadn’t changed. It was still the same out-of-place police box, despite everything it had been through.

And, when he thought about it, he was still the Doctor, despite his regeneration. How fitting.

-0--6--0-

The Doctor decided that if he was going to fix the chameleon circuit—really fix it—he’d need some extra help.

 _Cära?_ he thought.

Cära was quick to answer. _What’s up?_

The Doctor swallowed, trying to shove down as much pride as possible.

_I’ve a problem that you’re probably better equipped to deal with than me... The TARDIS chameleon circuit... I’ve finally decided that it’s time I get round to repairing it. Only... umm... I’ve done my best and I can’t seem to get it to work. We landed in a junkyard and the TARDIS became a fully functional pipe organ. And then a girl’s wardrobe. She simply won’t do anything that fits the environment._

There was silence for a few seconds. He figured she was busy laughing at him. Best to let her get it out now.

But her answer surprised him. Her voice became suddenly grumpy. That was unusual.

 _You’ve never had a problem with the police box shape before,_ she said.

That wasn’t strictly true. The Doctor had been rather confused when his ship hadn’t changed into something more suitable for prehistoric Earth when he’d taken that first accidental trip with a pair of humans aboard. He’d also become rather annoyed whenever people thought it was a real police box, or when they carted it off for it’s oddity. But it really had been nice, going centuries without worrying about which tree or Greek column was his TARDIS. It was also handy not having people try to put garbage in it or sacrifice animals on top of it.

But that was beside the point. He shoved down as much pride as he could before answering.

 _Well... that’s mostly true... but_ —He mentally shoved down some particularly acidic pride— _Peri seems to think the fact that I can’t fix the thing is rather hilarious._ The Doctor took a deep breath. _Please, Cära... would you come and give me a hand mending it?_

More silence.

 _Umm... not today, okay? I have to do... a thing,_ Cära said, hurriedly. Was that a note of panic in her voice?

_A **thing**?!_

_Yes, a thing!! Goodbye!!!_

The Doctor raised an eyebrow as the contact was abruptly cut off. How odd. Cära loved working with his TARDIS. She would normally jump at the chance to demonstrate her mastery over the finer points of repairs.

He sighed and shook his head, deciding to bother her about it later. At least his ship was back in its familiar police box shape.

-0--7--0-

The Doctor leaned against a wall, mopping his brow with the red bandana from his pocket.

Why couldn’t anything ever be simple?

It had started out as a perfectly normal trip (relatively speaking), but Ace had been kidnapped (which was still quite normal) and then she had been sentenced to death at sunrise (which happened more often than one would think, for a girl her age).

He’d gotten Ace back (again, quite normal), but then the TARDIS had been stolen (likely by the rivals of the people who had made the mistake of kidnapping Ace). The time machine was somewhere in this city, but the two of them hadn’t found it yet, and on top of that, they had patrols of at least one of the rival factions looking for them. The Doctor was quite desperate to leave these people to sort out their own problems (they wouldn’t listen to his advice and there was nothing more he could really do, so they could just hack it themselves). Now he and Ace were taking a moment to catch their breath in a secluded alley before having another go at finding the TARDIS.

“Got a plan, Professor?” Ace asked.

“That depends. How much Nitro-9 d’you have left?”

“ _Doctor._ ”

She never called him that unless things were really serious. Ace must be just as fed up with this mess as he was.

The Doctor sighed.

“Can’t do much until we find the TARDIS, Ace. Right now, my only plan is to find it and leave.”

“And you’re sure there’s nothing we can do?”

“They wouldn’t take my advice, Ace. And I’m not having you get sentenced to death twice in one day just to argue with them over things they won’t consider.”

Ace sighed, kicked a stray rock, and wandered over to see what the wall on the other side of the alley overlooked. The city was a built a bit like an MC Escher drawing combined with a multi-story parking garage. It was a maze-like assortment of multi-level alleys, buildings, and roads.

“Y’know, it’s a good job the TARDIS is blue,” Ace said.

“Mmm-hmm,” the Doctor said, absently.

Ace snorted. “Sticks out like a sore thumb on this planet.”

“I suppose so,” the Doctor said, eyeing the reddish stones that made up this civilization’s architecture. It was a bit boring, seeing nothing but this dark, rust-colored stone everywhere.

“... _Professor!_ ” Ace called, sounding annoyed.

The Doctor straightened up, but didn’t leave his spot. He was too busy trying to think of a plan.

“What?” he groused.

“Get over here!”

The Doctor reluctantly left his spot and walked over to where Ace was standing. She was pointing at something on the level below them.

It was the TARDIS. It was guarded, but only by a few tired-looking men.

The Doctor’s eyes widened, and, after a few moments, a smile began to form. An idea had finally begun to coalesce in his head, spurred on by the silent optimism of a blue box in a maze of reddish stone.

“You know, Ace, I think we may be able to change their minds after all.”

-0--8--0-

The Doctor’s eyes widened and tea shot out of his nose in surprise.

While he dealt with that, Cära cringed and seemed to fold in on herself, trying to be as small as possible.

The two Time Lords had been having a friendly chat outside a little tea shop on the planet Yuvora. They had met there with a plan to go to the town’s flower festival. And then the conversation had strayed to the blue police box shape that the Doctor’s TARDIS favored. He had asked her if she would mind looking at the chameleon circuit, not so that he could change it, but just so that he could have the satisfaction of knowing what had gone wrong. After several centuries of it being stuck that way, he was a bit curious.

Cära’s (rather flustered) response had been sudden and shocking indeed.

“You _what?!!_ ” he exclaimed, when he had gotten most of the tea out of his nose.

“I broke the chameleon circuit on purpose,” she said, eyes still shut. “Well, I didn’t _break it_ so much as _alter it_... Your TARDIS wanted to be a police box, okay?!”

“When did you do that?!”

Cära opened her eyes again. She swallowed.

“...remember a few centuries back when you had me over to make some repairs and I asked you to make me some tea? It was when you had landed in London in 1963 and Susan was starting school at Coal Hill.”

The Doctor froze, his eyes widening and staring off into space as his mind raced back through the past.

_Hey, Doctor, this might take awhile. I can manage, why don’t you go to the kitchen and make us some tea? Three sugars, okay?_

The kitchen had been so far away that it had taken him over forty-five minutes to find it, make tea for both of them, and get back to the console room. After that, he’d immediately begun researching—and subsequently abandoning—the manual’s instructions for fixing it. It had taken him about a week to come up with a repair that would move the kitchen closer, and he hadn’t actually got around to doing it for another month. And it had been several more months before he even realized that the TARDIS was stuck as a police box.

The Doctor sat in shock, his mouth hanging open a little. Finally, he said the only thing that came to mind:

“All this time… It was _YOU?!_ ”

Cära was cringing again, hard.

“Everything in me wants to say sorry, but nothing in me is actually sorry,” she said, with her eyes squeezed shut. “I’m very, very _not_ sorry.”

The Doctor abruptly got up, his chair scraping back against the ground. He rushed around to Cära’s side of the table and swept her up in a hug.

“Thank you!” he said.

She stiffened.

“You’re not mad?”

The Doctor laughed. “A few centuries ago, I might have been! But not now!”

Cära began to laugh too.

“Yeah, I can just see you as the old guy going _nuts_ if I told you back then,” she said.

The Doctor grinned. “Believe it or not, my TARDIS getting stuck as a blue box from the 1950’s is one of the best things that’s happened to me since I left Gallifrey.”

Cära stiffened again, just slightly, and her laughter stopped.

“You’re not just saying that, right?”

“No. Honestly.” The Doctor pressed a soft kiss to Cära’s right temple. “Honestly. Thank you, Cära.”

He leaned back, and Cära was smiling again.

“Thank your TARDIS,” she said. “She’s the one who picked that shape.”

-0--WAR--0-

The Warrior trudged back to his TARDIS.

The familiar blue exterior was battered and dusty and worn from so long in a horrible war, but it had stubbornly refused to deviate from it’s police box shape. Had he not been so tired, it might have made him smile.

It was a reminder of a happier time.

Of the man he used to be.

Of Cära.

He placed a hand on the worn exterior and felt the familiar hum. It was a bit of a different hum now, more strained and tired and sad. Just like him. But it was still there, still fighting, just like he was.

“It’ll be over soon, I suppose,” he said. He sighed. “I’m sorry to drag you into this, Old Girl.”

There was a soft feeling in his mind, a feeling that gave him the sense that his TARDIS wouldn’t have it any other way.

The Warrior shifted the bag on his back, opened the door of his TARDIS, and walked in.

It was time.

_No more._

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> Cära is an OC that I have worked on for several years, and I will be posting more stories of her adventures through time and space with the Doctor (which will explain her backstory) as soon as possible. She is a canon-compliant character.


End file.
